Libraries are cool. And I'm not just saying that because I'm a bookworm. Now, there might be even more reason for non-bookworms to ask for a library card and visit the establishment more often. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, that's what they say. Now, aside from the Library of Congress, it seems that other libraries across the country are getting on the same "preserve videogames" bandwagon.

The Campbell County Public Library in Kentucky just added a whole selection of various videogames into their collection of... media. Videogames are, after all, part of our cultural heritage. Anyone beg to differ?

As of now, the library is starting with a collection of over 50 games, and according to Anderson, the titles would be available for checking out within a week or two. Each branch of the library will host a different console: the Cold Spring branch gets PlayStation 2 games; the Fort Thomas Branch, Xbox 360 games; the Newport branch, Nintendo Wii games. (ooh, maybe they're deliberately doing this so as to separate the fanboys from each other - harhar! we kid!)

In each branch, there will be a rating board so that parents would know what games they could borrow for their kids. Cold Spring manager Dave Anderson says, though, that they won't be delivering "violent games with harsh language." [cue collective sigh of disappointment]

The selection will range from games like Kingdom Hearts (both I and II) and SpongeBob to Tony Hawk's Project 8 to Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2007. Despite the "violent games" restriction, there'll also be racing games and PS2 ports of Sega Genesis games (like Sonic and Virtua Fighter) for the adults. Besides, upon some research, they found out the adult early-30s bracket made up the biggest portion of the gaming population.

Whispers of a Jane Austen videogame being sighted among the shelves are yet to be confirmed.

CNET News reports that Stanford University Libraries">Henry Lowood, curator of the Science and Technology Collections at Stanford University Libraries have in their collection 25,000 plus videogames. The said curator is also in charge of archiving the electronic gems.

The 25,000 games originally belonged to former Stanford student Steven Cabernetti who passed away recently. What's noteworthy about this collection is that most of the titles are still in their original shrink-wrap. The games were gifted to the Stanford Library for use in their history of science and technology collections.

Henry Lowood, together with game designers Warren Spector and Steve Meretzky and academic researcher Matteo Bittanti and journalist Christopher Grant also came up with a list of the ten most important games of all time. The chronological list has been submitted for review and potential permanent preservation to the U.S. Library of Congress.

The ten games are: Spacewar (1962), Star Raiders (1979), Zork (1980), Tetris (1985), SimCity (1989), Super Mario Bros. 3 (1990), Civilization I/II (1991), Doom (1993), the Warcraft series (beginning 1994) and Sensible World of Soccer (1994).

CNET has a video report of the Stanford University Library collection and can be viewed via our "read" link below.

Henry Lowood, curator of the History of Science and Technology Collections at Stanford University, has a proposal that has been submitted for the consideration of the US Library of Congress, the research arm of the United States Congress and what is practically the national library of the United States of America.

The proposal, to use the words of Heather Chaplin from the New York Times, is video games have "a history worth preserving and a culture worth studying." The proposal was drafted by a consortium: Stanford University, the University of Maryland, and the University of Illinois.

Video games have a cultural and historical significance. On March 8 at the Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2007, Henry Lowood announced a game canon, a list of important video games worth preserving. "Creating this list is an assertion," Lowood said, "that digital games have a cultural significance and a historical significance."

The video game canon: "the stuff we have to protect first." Below is a list of the members of a five-person committee that presented a canon of games worth preserving at the GDC.

• Henry Lowood, curator, History of Science and Technology Collections, Stanford University
• Warren Spector and Steve Mertzky, game designers
• Matteo Bittanti, academic researcher, Humanities Lab, Stanford University
  
• Christopher Grant, game journalist, editor of joystiq.com
  

The National Film Preservation Board compiles an annual list of films that are added to the National Film Registry managed by the Library of Congress. If the US Congress believes that films aren't necessarily tools of the devil, then maybe the world is ready to agree that video games such as these are worth preserving for the rest of human history:

• Three classic games: Spacewar! (1962), Star Raiders (1979), Zork (1980)
• Tetris (1985) (The designer, Alexey Pajitnov, won a GDC Award at GDC 2007.)
  
• SimCity (1989)
• Super Mario Bros. 3 (1990)
• Civilization I (1991) / Civilization II (1996)
• Doom (1993)
• The Warcraft series: Warcraft: Orcs and Humans (1994), Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness (1995), Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos (2002)
  
• Sensible World of Soccer (1994)

"The game canon is a way of saying this is the stuff we have to protect first," said Spector.

Emulators and preservation. Lowood explained a particular challenge. Hardware has changed so much that thousands of games can only be played using emulators - which technically violate copyright laws. It's something to think about - isn't it - that emulators and piracy are serving, in their own way, to keep the memory of old games alive. Now let me see if I can bring up Shadow President (DC True, 1994) on DOSBox.

Chestbusters and more Giger monstrosities are soon going to be invading next-gen consoles and PCs, thanks to Sega and Obsidian Entertainment, with the former announcing today that the latter has been tapped to create a role-playing game based on the "Alien" film franchise.

Since its 1979 debut, Alien and its three sequels have grossed more than US$ 557 million worldwide, garnering numerous awards, including two Academy Awards. Alien was even deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress in 2002 and was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.

"We are thrilled to be working with the great production and publishing teams at SEGA to deliver the ultimate in-depth Alien experience to gamers worldwide," said Feargus Urquhart, CEO of Obsidian Entertainment. "Building an epic RPG with a license as heralded as the Alien franchise is truly a great honor."

Obsidian will be drawing upon their wealth of experience creating successful games such as the best-selling Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: Sith Lords and the award-winning Neverwinter Nights 2 to bring the "Alien" franchise to RPG fans for the first time. Here's hoping that it lives up to the sense of claustrophobia and terror that drove the film franchise to worldwide success.